Chet Gresham

Targets and Touches

Week 2 Target Watch – AFC

Welcome to the AFC version of Target Watch. You will find all of the AFC teams below, with all of their passing targets, plus some snap count data and words I came up with in my brain after tackling the NFC teams on Wednesday.

This was very much the Dennis Pitta target three hours of power. Pitta ran 28 passing routes compared to Ed Dickson’s 16. Last year it was quite difficult to predict who would see the most targets between the two from week to week. This could be the start of something good for Pitta, especially since he saw three red zone targets, but I would like to see a pattern develop.

Torrey Smith’s mediocre three targets were a bit disappointing. I don’t think it will be the norm, because it looked as if he wouldn’t just be the deep threat this season. This is another storyline to keep an eye on, but I think they’ll make a point to get him more looks this weekend.

Ray Rice only had 10 carries, but thankfully found the end zone twice. His overall usage was a little alarming, but there’s no doubt they want him with the ball in the red zone. This is yet another bit of usage we’ll need to watch as the Ravens new pass oriented offense finds its legs.

The Bills were flattened by the Jets and also lost David Nelson and Fred Jackson. That is what I’d call a bad game. Thankfully C.J. Spiller did his thing and went fantasy football crazy, gaining 194 yards and a touchdown on just 16 touches. That’s a pretty good 12 yards per touch.

Donald Jones saw plenty of targets and should continue to get them with Nelson out for the season.

Tight end Scott Chandler didn’t have six targets until week 11 last season, so that is good news for him. He’ll need to get that average a little above six to be fantasy relevant in single tight end leagues, but in two tight end leagues, he could be worthwhile soon.

Andrew Hawkins was the big news on Monday night for the Bengals as they were beaten like things that get beaten a lot. He was Dalton’s go to guy over the middle, catching eight passes for 86 yards on nine targets.

Armon Binns actually saw more work than Hawkins, 35 to 26 pass routes, but Hawkins was easily the go to guy when he was out there. He’s worth looking into for PPR aficionados.

Jermaine Gresham had a healthy eight targets, but only came up with three of them. I believe this is an anomaly and he’ll get back on track. The targets will be there and just like last season, he is a favorite of Dalton’s in the red zone where he had three targets on Monday.

It’s hard to get too excited about any of these target numbers with Brandon Weeden having a terrible debut. Unless he can improve and quickly, there’s no Cleveland receiver worth gambling on.

The best news here is Trent Richardson’s three targets. He was rusty against the Eagles, but with the workload it looks like he’ll be getting on the ground and through the air, it will be hard for him not to be a fantasy starter.

All the guessing as to who would be Peyton Manning’s go-to guys was pretty much right on. The duo of Thomas and Decker will continue to lead in targets, while Decker looks to be the guy in the red zone with two targets to Thomas’ none.

Jacob Tamme had 24 receiving routes to Dreessen’s 19, but had three more targets, including a red zone target that resulted in a touchdown. He’s the guy to own in Denver, but he is splitting time and has a better chance of throwing up a dud.

No other receiver really stepped up except for Owen Daniels, who continues to be the tight end to own in Houston. I was a little worried James Casey and Garrett Graham would cut into his targets, but it doesn’t seem to be the case.

Eighteen targets for Reggie Wayne gave me a warm fuzzy guttural feeling because I felt a big target year coming his way. Of course the addition of Austin Collie might cut into those targets a bit, but Andrew Luck will be throwing the ball often this season.

Wayne also had four red zone targets to Donnie Avery’s three. We most likely will see Collie get those instead of Avery if he’s back to full speed this week.

Coby Fleener ran 44 pass routes compared to Dwayne Allen’s 17 and Allen didn’t even see a target. Fleener is the guy to own no doubt.

The running backs were spread out quite a bit, with Donald Brown getting 28 snaps compared to 19 for Mewelde Moore and 11 for Vick Ballard. With Brown not being the passing down back, he will have trouble remaining fantasy relevant unless he can take one of his few carries into the end zone like he did against the Bears.

I’m still not sold on Blaine Gabbert as a quarterback who can sustain fantasy receivers. They faced a poor Minnesota Viking pass defense and Gabbert had his best game as a pro and Cecil Shorts was the fantasy star. And Shorts was only on the field for 14 plays. Unless he gets a big boost in playing time next week, he’ll be impossible to trust on your fantasy team.

The real fantasy winners should have been Laurent Robinson and Justin Blackmon, but they weren’t. I’m not giving up on Blackmon because his skills after the catch are impressive.

Maurice Jones-Drew was on the field for 49 plays compared to Rashad Jennings’ 19. Jennings sustained an injury, but Jones-Drew was going to take over the lead back duties anyway.

Welcome to the AFC version of Target Watch. You will find all of the AFC teams below, with all of their passing targets, plus some snap count data and words I came up with in my brain after tackling the NFC teams on Wednesday.

This was very much the Dennis Pitta target three hours of power. Pitta ran 28 passing routes compared to Ed Dickson’s 16. Last year it was quite difficult to predict who would see the most targets between the two from week to week. This could be the start of something good for Pitta, especially since he saw three red zone targets, but I would like to see a pattern develop.

Torrey Smith’s mediocre three targets were a bit disappointing. I don’t think it will be the norm, because it looked as if he wouldn’t just be the deep threat this season. This is another storyline to keep an eye on, but I think they’ll make a point to get him more looks this weekend.

Ray Rice only had 10 carries, but thankfully found the end zone twice. His overall usage was a little alarming, but there’s no doubt they want him with the ball in the red zone. This is yet another bit of usage we’ll need to watch as the Ravens new pass oriented offense finds its legs.

The Bills were flattened by the Jets and also lost David Nelson and Fred Jackson. That is what I’d call a bad game. Thankfully C.J. Spiller did his thing and went fantasy football crazy, gaining 194 yards and a touchdown on just 16 touches. That’s a pretty good 12 yards per touch.

Donald Jones saw plenty of targets and should continue to get them with Nelson out for the season.

Tight end Scott Chandler didn’t have six targets until week 11 last season, so that is good news for him. He’ll need to get that average a little above six to be fantasy relevant in single tight end leagues, but in two tight end leagues, he could be worthwhile soon.

Andrew Hawkins was the big news on Monday night for the Bengals as they were beaten like things that get beaten a lot. He was Dalton’s go to guy over the middle, catching eight passes for 86 yards on nine targets.

Armon Binns actually saw more work than Hawkins, 35 to 26 pass routes, but Hawkins was easily the go to guy when he was out there. He’s worth looking into for PPR aficionados.

Jermaine Gresham had a healthy eight targets, but only came up with three of them. I believe this is an anomaly and he’ll get back on track. The targets will be there and just like last season, he is a favorite of Dalton’s in the red zone where he had three targets on Monday.

It’s hard to get too excited about any of these target numbers with Brandon Weeden having a terrible debut. Unless he can improve and quickly, there’s no Cleveland receiver worth gambling on.

The best news here is Trent Richardson’s three targets. He was rusty against the Eagles, but with the workload it looks like he’ll be getting on the ground and through the air, it will be hard for him not to be a fantasy starter.

All the guessing as to who would be Peyton Manning’s go-to guys was pretty much right on. The duo of Thomas and Decker will continue to lead in targets, while Decker looks to be the guy in the red zone with two targets to Thomas’ none.

Jacob Tamme had 24 receiving routes to Dreessen’s 19, but had three more targets, including a red zone target that resulted in a touchdown. He’s the guy to own in Denver, but he is splitting time and has a better chance of throwing up a dud.

No other receiver really stepped up except for Owen Daniels, who continues to be the tight end to own in Houston. I was a little worried James Casey and Garrett Graham would cut into his targets, but it doesn’t seem to be the case.

Eighteen targets for Reggie Wayne gave me a warm fuzzy guttural feeling because I felt a big target year coming his way. Of course the addition of Austin Collie might cut into those targets a bit, but Andrew Luck will be throwing the ball often this season.

Wayne also had four red zone targets to Donnie Avery’s three. We most likely will see Collie get those instead of Avery if he’s back to full speed this week.

Coby Fleener ran 44 pass routes compared to Dwayne Allen’s 17 and Allen didn’t even see a target. Fleener is the guy to own no doubt.

The running backs were spread out quite a bit, with Donald Brown getting 28 snaps compared to 19 for Mewelde Moore and 11 for Vick Ballard. With Brown not being the passing down back, he will have trouble remaining fantasy relevant unless he can take one of his few carries into the end zone like he did against the Bears.

I’m still not sold on Blaine Gabbert as a quarterback who can sustain fantasy receivers. They faced a poor Minnesota Viking pass defense and Gabbert had his best game as a pro and Cecil Shorts was the fantasy star. And Shorts was only on the field for 14 plays. Unless he gets a big boost in playing time next week, he’ll be impossible to trust on your fantasy team.

The real fantasy winners should have been Laurent Robinson and Justin Blackmon, but they weren’t. I’m not giving up on Blackmon because his skills after the catch are impressive.

Maurice Jones-Drew was on the field for 49 plays compared to Rashad Jennings’ 19. Jennings sustained an injury, but Jones-Drew was going to take over the lead back duties anyway.

Easily the biggest news here is Dexter McCluster’s 10 targets and Jonathon Baldwin’s zero. McCluster ran 30 routes, second only to Dwayne Bowe’s 33. He also saw one of the two red zone targets on the day.

The problem of course is that the Chiefs were down quickly and went to the pass, whereas they would much rather run the ball as often as possible. The Chiefs defense will be getting some key players back and won’t always be facing a high-powered offense like the Falcons. With Bowe as the number one guy, McCluster isn’t going to see ten targets all that often.

Peyton Hillis and Jamaal Charles split up work about as we envisioned. It wasn’t 50/50 like we’d been duped to believe of course. Charles was on the field for 29 plays compared to Hillis’ 19, while Draughn came in for garbage time.

Much like the Brandon Weedon experiment, the Ryan Tannehill show needed to be postponed for a few extra dress rehearsals. They were facing one of the best defenses in the league, so I’d like to see Tannehill face an easier matchup before I write off the Dolphins passing game for the foreseeable future, but they’ll need to show me before I take the bait.

The best news was probably for Reggie Bush who had 20 looks on the day and accumulated 115 total yards. Bush was only backed up by Daniel Thomas who ended his day with a concussion. Look for Bush to continue carrying the load.

The lack of targets is a big topic of discussion in the fantasy football community and for good reason. In only one game last season did Welker see less targets than he had in week one. Is this a trend? His 22 pass routes are one of the lowest game totals I’ve seen for him in quite some time, but the Patriots did run the ball more than usual. Coach Belichick is all about situational football, so we could see Welker get 20 targets next week. I’m taking a wait and see attitude.

Stevan Ridley is probably the biggest story coming out of week one. His 23 touches is a very good sign for a team that likes to micro-manage their running backs. He had six looks in the red zone, so we’re not talking the Green Bay Packers offense here. Ridley can get into the end zone just like BenJarvus Green-Ellis did last season, but maybe more so.

It seemed like we’d have to wait on Stephen Hill to make an impact in this league, but he went ahead without us and grabbed a couple touchdowns and saw the second most time on the field, behind only veteran Santonio Holmes. And after his big game it will take a lot to knock him out of that number two receiver position.

Jeremy Kerley had a big day and was only behind Hill and Holmes by a few snaps, so it will be interesting to see if he continues that workload. He also had two targets in the red zone, to help out his cause.

Shonn Greene only had one target on 10 pass routes, while Bilal Powell had one on 11 pass routes. That’s about as even as you can get, but Powell may start seeing more passing down work, which will hurt Greene when they don’t have big leads like last week.

Holy Targets McFadden Man! Zoinks! Eighteen targets for a running back didn’t happen one time last year. Roy Helu came close with 17, but that’s one less than 18 I think. Of course his rushing numbers were abysmal, but 13 receptions will get you through anything in a PPR league. He won’t see that many usually, but he’s the guy and the guy’s uncle in Oakland.

With Denarius Moore out, Rod Streater had a target fest, but fumbled and only caught four of the ten targets. Thankfully for those that started him, he got into the end zone.

The offense was not right for Oakland, but they have weapons. These numbers are going to fluctuate quite a bit until they get things right. Heyward-Bey and McFadden are the shoreline in which the sea is crashing. Hold steady with them.

The three Steelers wide receivers were used extensively in Denver. Antonio Brown and Mike Wallace ran 49 and 46 pass routes, while Emmanuel Sanders ran 38. Brown and Wallace are of course the main guys, but a healthy Sanders will continue to get targets in Todd Haley’s offense.

Antonio Brown’s three red zone targets are a nice stat to hold in your back pocket. He’ll continue getting looks near the goal line and should improve on his two touchdowns from last year by quite a few.

The running back situation broke down as Jonathan Dwyer being on the field for 42 snaps compared to 24 for Isaac Redman. And now Coach Tomlin has said Dwyer will see even more work going forward. Dwyer is the guy to own right now.

There wasn’t a whole lot of production coming out of the Charger’s offense late Monday night that didn’t involve three pointers, but we did learn that Antonio Gates and Malcom Floyd are the go to receivers. We knew that about Gates of course, but there was some debate around Floyd.

Floyd also had three targets in the red zone compared to one for Gates. If he can stay healthy, 10 touchdowns are very much in his future.

Without Kenny Britt, we saw a lot of Damian Williams. This weekend I believe we will only be able to count on Nate Washington and Jared Cook. Speaking of Jared Cook, last season it was like pulling teeth, trying to get him a full game on the field. But this year, he was out there more than any other receiver. As long as that keeps up, he’ll be worthwhile in fantasy.

Chris Johnson saved his day, at least for PPR leaguers, by catching six passes. It wasn’t enough for where you drafted him of course, but hopefully his PPR value will stay in the realm of fantasy relevance even if he continues to rot as a rusher.